Our household object for today is the fireplace and our Bible passage is Genesis 18:27-33.

When I was a child visiting my grandparents’ house, the open fire in the living room was both cosy and inviting. Fire produces both heat and light, but as it burns, it produces smoke and ash; it consumes everything, turning it into grey powder. As an adult, I discovered making fires was not as easy as it had looked as a child, and that fire had both advantages and disadvantages.

Abraham, in the passage for today, recognised his lowliness (‘I who am but dust and ashes.’) We recognise our lowliness and mortality when in the Ash Wednesday service and funeral services we say ‘remember that you are but dust and to dust you shall return.’) Far from being morbid, such honesty is necessary if we are to grow spiritually. Humility and repentance are at the heart of our faith journey; when we approach God in this way, acknowledging the purifying effect of His fire, we will also know the warmth of His love and mercy.

Last week we had a flurry of snow in our area, just enough for children to have a snowball fight and to build snowmen. My grandchildren built a snow woman called Sheila and her baby, Melody (named after their baby sister.) To build a snowman, you need to roll several ‘balls’ – two for the body and one for the head and then sculpt them together. Apparently last week’s snow was ideal for this, rolling and compacting well.

Sin is rather like a snowball. It starts innocently enough, so we suppose, with a fleeting thought. If we dwell on that thought, however, it soon becomes more of an obsession than a thought: this is what happened to Saul, whose irritation at the song ‘Saul has slain his thousands but David his tens of thousands’ (1 Sam 18:7) soon blossomed into irrational paranoia and hatred and then led to murder. (1 Samuel 22:17) James describes it in this way: ‘each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.’ (James 1:14-15)

How do we avoid becoming like Saul, enmeshed in sin, going from bad to worse? We have to be ruthless with sin (Paul tells us, ‘do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. ¹³ Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness.’ Rom 6:12-13) and refuse to let it snowball, confessing our sins and receiving forgiveness. We have to test ourselves, Paul says, (2 Cor 13:5), and ask God to search us and know us so that we can be led in right paths (Ps 139:23-24).

1 Samuel 22:6-23 tells the story of what happened next after David had sought sanctuary, food and weapons from the priest Ahimelek at Nob. It’s a sad story, with Saul’s paranoia and murderous rage being given free rein, and Doeg the Edomite willing not only to betray David by telling Saul what he had seen but also to kill not only the priests at Nob but the innocent infants, children and livestock there. It’s a sober reminder to us all that ‘a man reaps what he sows’ (Gal 6:9) and that there are always consequences to our actions.

We live in a fallen world, marred by sin. Saul, by this time, is thoroughly consumed by jealousy and terror, unable to listen to reason, seeing conspiracy and treachery everywhere. Being in a position of power in this state was disastrous for individuals (85 priests were killed in one day) but also for a nation called to be the people of God. Doeg the Edomite was unscrupulous, wishing to curry favour with the king, so when other officials balked at the command to kill God’s priests, he had no such qualms. David wrote about him in Psalm 52, reflecting that the evil man must be left to God’s justice. It must have been extremely difficult for David to see evil flourishing all around him, but he promised Abiathar, the only survivor of the senseless massacre, protection. (1 Sam 22:22-23) We cannot avoid the consequences of sin around us, but we can act in right ways ourselves when we see evil flourish.

We had a great family fun day this week during the half-term holidays,with 117 people attending.The theme was love (it was Valentine’s Day and Ash Wednesday)..Our thanks to all who helped and to all who came!

We had lots of craft activities based on the theme of love: